“No. Culprits at sea are run up to the yard-arm. A naval execution is a solemn sight. On the fatal morn, there is an influence felt by the seamen, and if little is said about what is going on, you may read it in their faces. The crews of the different ships in harbour are turned up, and in the rigging and along the gangways, groups and lines of blue-jackets, may be seen. The boats of the fleet are manned, and, with a party of marines in each, are drawn up abreast the ship where the execution is about to take place. All this occurs early in the morning. At last comes the unhappy culprit. He mounts the platform, that stretches across the forecastle; a dead silence prevails; the sentence that has been recorded against the prisoner by the court-martial is read, as well as the articles of war under which he has been condemned; the signal-gun gives the fatal flash, and the unhappy man is run up to the fore-yard-arm.”
“It must be very solemn! But we hardly ever hear of a sailor being condemned to death.”
“Not often. It is terrible to think of a blue-jacket, who ought to be famed for honour and honesty, dangling like a hanged dog at the yard-arm of a seventy-four.”
“Terrible indeed. Please to tell us of a soldier’s burial.”
“Those who have seen the funeral of a soldier, especially that of a cavalry officer, know it to be a solemn gathering; but I will not dwell upon it. The death-like sound of the muffled drum is withering to the heart; the mournful melody of wind-instruments, the slow and measured steps of the procession, the coffin where the dead man lies, the subdued appearance of the charger, mournfully accoutred, oppress the spirit, and the helmet and the sword, and gauntlets, tug at the spectators’ heartstrings. He must have a strong bosom who can hear the blast of the crape-bound trumpet, the roll of the muffled drum, and the three-fold volley over the soldier’s grave, without a sigh.”
“It must be very solemn, but not so sad as shooting a soldier, or hanging a sailor at the yard-arm.”
“The thought of death should lead a soldier to act humbly in his life. The tallest grenadier ought not to lift his head proudly above the lowest man in the regiment. But I have not yet told you anything of a sailor’s burial. When a seaman dies he is sewn up in his hammock, with a couple of shot fastened between his feet. As he lies upon a grating, with his comrades around him, the chaplain of the ship, or the captain, reads the Burial Service appointed for the dead at sea. He is then turned off the grating and is soon on his way to the bottom of the deep, sinking feet-foremost through the cold blue waters. But we are forgetting the battle of Waterloo, and my time is almost up; if I do not tell you about it now I may not have another opportunity.”
“Begin directly! It will never do to pass it over, such a famous battle as it was.”
“My account must be a very short one. I can fancy myself now on the spot. There is the château of Hougomont! there the farm-house La Haye Sainte, and yonder are the heights of La Belle Alliance! Under any circumstances a battle on an extended scale is an affair of absorbing interest, but when, as it were, the welfare of the civilized world trembles in the balance; when the sword is about to decide whether nations are to be liberated or fettered with adamantine chains; whether millions are to breathe the breath of freedom, or bow their necks beneath the iron yoke of an ambitious despot, well may a fervent prayer be offered up to the God of battles, that right may triumph, and that rapine and wrong may be humbled in the dust. The battle of Waterloo was to wrench from Napoleon Buonaparte the sword of his might, or to place an iron sceptre in his hand wherewith to bruise the nations of the world at his pleasure. It pleased the God of armies that the proud should be effectually overthrown.”
“Ay! Buonaparte was humbled in that battle.”